1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates generally to systems for packaging medicaments in a manner that increases a patient's compliance with a treatment regimen.
2. Related Art
Treatment of many common illnesses dictates the administration of medicaments in a planned and controlled manner. In a typical scenario, a physician prescribes a course of treatment for a patient, and the patient is responsible for taking a prescribed medication according to the instructions of the physician. However, many studies have indicated that patients fail to comply with instructions provided to the patient by the physician.
Reasons for a patient's noncompliance with a treatment regimen have been shown to vary. In some cases, a physician may prescribe multiple medications aimed at treating different aspects of an illness. As the number of medications prescribed increases, the responsibility on the part of the patient increases due to different dosages, intervals between dosages, and the like. This increase in number of medications can cause a patient to forget to take a particular medication, or cause him or her to fail to remember whether or not a particular medication has been taken.
A patient's noncompliance with a prescribed regimen can lead to several problems. First, the desired effect, or the most beneficial effect, of treatment may not be obtained. Second, when missing a dose, a patient may attempt to rectify the situation by taking an additional dose. However, a dose taken at the incorrect time and interval could have severe consequences for some drugs. In addition, irregular drug administration could lead to drug resistance.
Oftentimes, patients rely on their memory and/or on manually operated medication dispensers to manage their treatment and their compliance with the instructions provided by the physician. For example, patients may rely on daily dosage pillboxes, or similar devices, to remind them to take their medication on a daily basis. However, these devices do not generally include any indicators for determining proper dosage intervals, especially for medications that must be taken more than once a day. Moreover, these devices do not provide any mechanism for alerting a patient to the proper time and/or day for taking the prescribed medication.
Several efforts have been made to produce a device or method to help improve patient compliance with treatment regimens. Some recently developed medicament dispensing containers include audible and visual alerts to remind a patient that it is time to take a medicine. However, such devices are overly complex, require relatively sophisticated and cumbersome programming operations, and only operate properly if the medication packaging is maintained within visual or auditory range of the patient.